The British Museum has admitted to using translations of poems by Qiu Jin without the permission of the translator in a new exhibition. Image courtesy of British Museum
June 22 (UPI) — The British Museum has admitted to using translations of poems by Qiu Jin without the permission of the translator in a new exhibition.
The translator, Yilin Wang, who uses she/they pronouns, had blasted the institution in a series of tweets for using the translation of Qiu Jin’s poems without crediting them. Qiu Jin was a Chinese revolutionary and feminist writer who was executed after a failed uprising against the Qing dynasty in 1907.
“It’s come to my attention that your exhibit ‘China’s hidden century’ uses my translations of Qiu Jin’s poetry, but you never contacted me for permission. Please note this is a copyright infringement!” Wang said in their initial tweet.
Wang later demanded that all their translations be removed from the exhibit, including all exhibition books and signage, unless the museum “makes a proper offer” to compensate them.
“Recently we realized that permissions and acknowledgement for a translation by Yilin Wang had been inadvertently omitted from our exhibition China’s hidden century. This was an unintentional human error for which the Museum has apologized to Yilin Wang,” the museum said in a statement.
The British Museum said it has taken down all of their translations in the exhibit and offered them financial payment for the amount of time the translations appeared in the institution.
“The British Museum takes copyright permissions seriously. Across the range of our work, we make every effort to contact the owners of rights in text, images, print and digital media,” the museum said.
“This was a particularly complicated project and we recognize we made an inadvertent mistake and fell short of our usual standards.”
Museum officials said the institution worked with more than 400 people from 20 countries on the exhibit and that workers have been subject to “personal attacks on social media” from Wang’s supporters.
“We stand behind our colleagues fully and request those responsible for these personal attacks to desist as we work with Yilin Wang to resolve the issues they have raised concerning the use of their translations within the exhibition,” the museum said.
Wang followed up after the British Museum’s statement and said that the she had received the offer for payment.
However, they said they also received an email from the museum that reads: “We will not be reinstating the translations in the exhibition that have been removed following your complaint, and therefore you will not be acknowledged in the exhibition as your work will not be featured.”